Cults – The Ultimate Mind Control Method

For Decades, the Feds have had a Thing for Cults. From the Manson Cult, to Waco, to Jonestown, to Heavens Gate, they have had their fingers in them all and way more.

from ICSA Website

ICSA does NOT maintain a list of “bad” groups or “cults.” We non-judgmentally list groups on which we have information. Groups listed, described, or referred to on ICSA’s Web sites may be mainstream or non-mainstream, controversial or non-controversial, religious or nonreligious, cult or not cult, harmful or benign. We encourage inquirers to consider a variety of opinions, negative and positive, so that inquirers can make independent and informed judgments pertinent to their particular concerns.

What is a Cult?

Adapted from Cults: Questions and Answers

by Michael D.Langone, Ph.D.

1988, AFF

A cult is a group or movement exhibiting a great or excessive devotion or dedication to some person, idea, or thing, and employing unethically manipulative techniques of persuasion and control designed to advance the goals of the group’s leader, to the actual or possible detriment of members, their families, or the community.

These groups tend to dictate, sometimes in great detail, how members should think, act, and feel, claim a special exalted status for themselves and/or their leader(s), and intensify their opposition to and alienation from society at large.

Because the capacity to exploit human beings is universal, any group could become a cult. However, most mainstream, established groups have accountability mechanisms that restrain the development of cultic subgroups.
 

How Many Cults Exist and How Many Members Do They Have?
Cult-education organizations have received inquiries about more than 3,000 groups. Although the majority of groups are small, some have tens of thousands of members. Experts estimate that five to ten million people have been involved with cultic groups at one time or another.
 

What is Mind Control?
Mind control (also known as “brainwashing,” “coercive persuasion,” and “thought reform”) refers to a process in which a group or individual systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator(s).

Such methods include the following:

• extensive control of information in order to limit alternatives from which members may make “choices”
• deception
• group pressure
• intense indoctrination into a belief system that denigrates independent critical thinking and considers the world outside the group to be threatening, evil, or gravely in error an insistence that members’ distress-much of which may consist of anxiety and guilt subtly induced by the group-can be relieved only by conforming to the group
• physical and/or psychological debilitation through inadequate diet or fatigue the induction of dissociative (trance-like) states via the misuse of meditation, chanting, speaking in tongues, and other exercises in which attention is narrowed, suggestibility heightened, and independent critical thinking weakened
• alternation of harshness/threats and leniency/love in order to effect compliance with the leadership’s wishes isolation from social supports pressured public confessions
   

Who Joins Cults and Why?
Contrary to a popular misconception that cult members are “crazy,” research and clinical evidence strongly suggests that most cult members are relatively normal.

They include the young, the middle-aged, elderly, the wealthy, the poor, the educated, and the uneducated from every ethnic and religious background. There is no easily identifiable type of person who joins cults.
 

How Do People Who Join Cults Change?
After converts commit themselves to a group, the cult’s way of thinking, feeling, and acting becomes second nature, while important aspects of their pre-cult personalities are suppressed or, in a sense, decay through disuse.

New converts at first frequently appear to be shell-shocked; they may appear “spaced out,” rigid and stereotyped in their responses, limited in their use of language, impaired in their ability to think critically, and oddly distant in their relationships with others. Intense cultic manipulations can trigger altered states of consciousness in some people.
 

Why Do People Leave Cults?
People leave for a variety of reasons. After becoming aware of hypocrisy and/or corruption within the cult, converts who have maintained an element of independence and some connection with their old values may simply walk out. Others may leave because they are weary of a routine of proselytizing and fund-raising.

Sometimes even the most dedicated members may feel so inadequate in the face of the cult’s demands that they walk away because they feel like abject failures. Others may renounce the cult after reconnecting to old values, goals, interests, or relationships, resulting from visits with parents, talks with ex-members, or exit counseling.
 

Is Leaving a Cult Easy?
People who consider leaving a cult are usually pressured to stay. Some ex-members say they spent months, even years, trying to garner the strength to walk out. Some felt so intimidated they departed secretly.

Although many cult members eventually walk out on their own, many, if not most, who leave cults on their own are psychologically harmed, often in ways they do not understand. Some cult members never leave, and some of these are severely harmed.

There is no way to predict who will leave, who won’t leave, or who will be harmed. ?

 

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Cults Formation
by Robert Jay Lifton, M.D.
The Harvard Mental Health Letter
Volume 7, Number 8 February 1981,
reprinted in AFF News Vol. 2 No. 5, 1996
 

I am often asked, “What is brainwashing, mind-control, and thought-reform?” Few words arouse such strong feelings. Dr. Robert J. Lifton’s study in the 50’s of the Chinese re-education universities has become a mental-health standard for what defines these terms. In this issue of AFF News Dr. Lifton explores the process of Cult Formation and the key components of the thought-reform environment. Robert Jay Lifton, M.D. is Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at John Jay College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His most recent book, written with Erik Markuson, is The Genocidal Mentality: Nazi Holocaust and Nuclear Threat (New York, Basic Books, 1990) .

Two main concerns should inform our moral and psychological perspective on cults:

1. the dangers of ideological totalism, or what I would also call fundamentalism
2. the need to protect civil liberties

There is now a worldwide epidemic of totalism and fundamentalism in forms that are political, religious or both. Fundamentalism is a particular danger in this age of nuclear weapons, because it often includes a theology of Armageddon–a final battle between good and evil.

I have studied Chinese thought reform in the 1950s as well as related practices in McCarthyite American politics and in certain training and educational programs. I have also examined these issues in work with Vietnam veterans, who often movingly rejected war related totalism; and more recently in a study of the psychology of Nazi doctors.

Certain psychological themes which recur in these various historical contexts also arise in the study of cults.

Cults can be identified by three characteristics:

• a charismatic leader who increasingly becomes an object of worship as the general principles that may have originally sustained the group lose their power
• a process I call coercive persuasion or thought reform
• economic, sexual, and other exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie

Milieu Control

The first method characteristically used by ideological totalism is milieu control: the control of all communication within a given environment. In such an environment individual autonomy becomes a threat to the group. There is an attempt to manage an individual’s inner communication.

Milieu control is maintained and expressed by intense group process, continuous psychological pressure, and isolation by geographical distance, unavailability of transportation, or even physical restraint. Often the group creates an increasingly intense sequence of events such as seminars, lectures and encounters which makes leaving extremely difficult, both physically and psychologically.

Intense milieu control can contribute to a dramatic change of identity which I call doubling: the formation of a second self which lives side by side with the former one, often for a considerable time.

When the milieu control is lifted, elements of the earlier self may be reasserted.
 

Creating a Pawn

A second characteristic of totalistic environments is mystical manipulation or planned spontaneity. This is a systematic process through which the leadership can create in cult members what I call the psychology of the pawn. The process is managed so that it appears to arise spontaneously; to its objects it rarely feels like manipulation.

Religious techniques such as fasting, chanting and limited sleep are used. Manipulation may take on a special intense quality in a cult for which a particular chosen’ human being is the only source of salvation. The person of the leader may attract members to the cult, but can also be a source of disillusionment. If members of the Unification Church, for example, come to believe that Sun Myung Moon, its founder, is associated with the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, they may lose their faith.

Mystical manipulation may also legitimate deception of outsiders, as in the “heavenly deception” of the Unification Church and analogous practices in other cult environments. Anyone who has not seen the light and therefore lives in the realm of evil can be justifiably deceived for a higher purpose.

For instance, collectors of funds may be advised to deny their affiliation with a cult that has a dubious public reputation.
 

Purity and Confession

Two other features of totalism are a demand for purity and a cult of confession. The demand for purity is a call for radical separation of good and evil within the environment and within oneself. Purification is a continuing process, often institutionalized in the cult of confession, which enforces conformity through guilt and shame evoked by mutual criticism and self-criticism in small groups.

Confessions contain varying mixtures of revelation and concealment.

As Albert Camus observed,

“Authors of confessions write especially to avoid confession, to tell nothing of what they know.”

Young cult members confessing the sins of their precultic lives may leave out ideas and feelings that they are not aware of or reluctant to discuss, including a continuing identification with their prior existence.

Repetitious confession, especially in required meetings, often expresses an arrogance in the name of humility. As Camus wrote:

“I practice the profession of penitence to be able to end up as a judge,” and, “The more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you.”

Three further aspects of ideological totalism are “sacred science,” “loading of the language,” and the principle of “doctrine over person.” Sacred science is important because a claim of being scientific is often needed to gain plausibility and influence in the modern age.

The Unification Church is one example of a contemporary tendency to combine dogmatic religious principles with a claim to special scientific knowledge of human behavior and psychology. The term ‘loading the language’ refers to literalism and a tendency to deify words or images. A simplified, cliché-ridden language can exert enormous psychological force reducing every issue in a complicated life to a single set of slogans that are said to embody the truth as a totality.

The principle of doctrine over person’ is invoked when cult members sense a conflict between what they are experiencing and what dogma says they should experience. The internalized message of the totalistic environment is that one must negate that personal experience on behalf of the truth of the dogma. Contradictions become associated with guilt: doubt indicates one’s own deficiency or evil.

Perhaps the most significant characteristic of totalistic movements is what I call “dispensing of existence.” Those who have not seen the light and embraced the truth are wedded to evil, tainted, and therefore in some sense, usually metaphorical, lack the right to exist.

That is one reason why a cult member threatened with being cast into outer darkness may experience a fear of extinction or collapse. Under particularly malignant conditions, the dispensing of existence is taken literally; in the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and elsewhere, people were put to death for alleged doctrinal shortcomings. In the People’s Temple mass suicide-murder in Guyana, a cult leader presided over the literal dispensing of existence by means of a suicidal mystique he himself had made a central theme in the group’s ideology.

The totalistic impulse to draw a sharp line between those who have the right to live and those who do not is especially dangerous in the nuclear age.
 

Historical Context

Totalism should always be considered within a specific historical context. A significant feature of contemporary life is the historical (or psycho historical) dislocation resulting from a loss of the symbolic structures that organize ritual transitions in the life cycle, and a decay of belief systems concerning religion, authority, marriage, family, and death.

One function of cults is to provide a group initiation rite for the transition to early adult life, and the formation of an adult identity outside the family. Cult members have good reasons for seeing attempts by the larger culture to make such provisions as hypocritical or confused.

In providing substitute symbols for young people, cults are both radical and reactionary. They are radical because they suggest rude questions about middle-class family life and American political and religious values in general. They are reactionary because they revive pre-modern structures of authority and sometimes establish fascist patterns of internal organization.

Furthermore, in their assault on autonomy and self-definition some cults reject a liberating historical process that has evolved with great struggle and pain in the West since the Renaissance. Cults must be considered individually in making such judgments. Historical dislocation is one source of what I call the “protean style.”

This involves a continuous psychological experimentation with the self, a capacity for endorsing contradictory ideas at the same time, and a tendency to change one’s ideas, companions and way of life with relative ease. Cults embody a contrary ‘restricted style,’ a flight from experimentation and the confusion of a protean world. These contraries are related: groups and individuals can embrace a protean and a restricted style in turn.

For instance, the so-called hippie ethos of the 1960s and 1970s has been replaced by the present so-called Yuppie preoccupation with safe jobs and comfortable incomes. For some people, experimentation with a cult is part of the protean search.

The imagery of extinction derived from the con temporary threat of nuclear war influences patterns of totalism and fundamentalism throughout the world. Nuclear war threatens human continuity itself and impairs the symbols of immortality. Cults seize upon this threat to provide immortalizing principles of their own.

The cult environment supplies a continuous opportunity for the experience of transcendence — a mode of symbolic immortality generally suppressed in advanced industrial society.
 

Role of Psychology

Cults raise serious psychological concerns, and there is a place for psychologists and psychiatrists in understanding and treating cult members.

But our powers as mental health professionals are limited, so we should exercise restraint. When helping a young person confused about a cult situation, it is important to maintain a personal therapeutic contract so that one is not working for the cult or for the parents.

Totalism begets totalism. What is called deprogramming includes a continuum from intense dialogue on the one hand to physical coercion and kidnapping, with thought-reform-like techniques, on the other. My own position, which I have repeatedly conveyed to parents and others who consult me, is to oppose coercion at either end of the cult process. Cults are primarily a social and cultural rather than a psychiatric or legal problem.

But psychological professionals can make important contributions to the public education crucial for dealing with the problem. With greater knowledge about them, people are less susceptible to deception, and for that reason some cults have been finding it more difficult to recruit members.

Yet painful moral dilemmas remain. When laws are violated through fraud or specific harm to recruits, legal intervention is clearly indicated. But what about situations in which behavior is virtually automatized, language reduced to rote and cliché, yet the cult member expresses a certain satisfaction or even happiness?

We must continue to seek ways to encourage a social commitment to individual autonomy and avoid coercion and violence.
 

by ‘Prof. Wolf von Archensbak‘

translated for Call of Cthulhu by Andy J. Bradbury

from White Dwarf Games Workshop

November 1985, #71

Spanish version

Italian version

“Cults of the Dark Gods” (Andy Bradbury, pp 16-17) Article discussing actual cults and groups in historical terms, interpreting them ‘a la Cthulhu.’

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE

This material is a translation of a part of the researches of ‘Professor von Archensbak’ related to certain cults, or quasi-religions, believed to be connected with the plans of the Great Old Ones to resume their domination of our planet.
 

The Professor had originally intended to withhold this information until he had completed his major work on Cthulhu-orientated cults.

After the recent death of the great Bulgarian scholar, ‘Dr. Philius Sadowsky,’ whilst he was preparing a definitive commentary on the Necronomicon, however, von Archensbak has asked me to prepare a synopsis of his findings for immediate publication.

THE VICTORY OF THE SANDS

Following the publication of my monograph on the Sigsand, or Sussex, Manuscript I have received a number of letters from self-styled fellow ‘researchers’.

In many cases these communicants were mere cranks of one persuasion or another. Yet in the midst of this nonsense certain information has been drawn to my attention, by one who wishes to remain anonymous, which has both confirmed certain data already in my possession and more importantly, has fleshed out certain portions of that data which were hitherto sketchy and unclear.

As I stated in my earlier work, there can be little doubt that the Sigsand Manuscript is either wholly derived from some Arabic source, or at least depends upon such work for its central thesis. What was unclear to me when I wrote those words, however, was the identity of that original material.

Let me state, quite categorically, that the document to which I refer is still unknown to me. Nevertheless I am at least able to indicate the probable source of the Sigsand material, together with a list of the main groups, or cults, through which that teaching has been disseminated down the ages, even unto the present day.

As the American writer, H.P. Lovecraft, has so often observed, the time of the Great Old Ones‘ rule on Earth most surely preceded our own times by many millennia. Yet the knowledge of their being and of their power, together with the loathsome and blasphemous rites inspired by that knowledge, has persisted within isolated groups like some dreadful canker upon the soul and body of the human race.

Thus far had my researches led before new information was laid before me. A simple belief that such ‘lost’ peoples as the dreaded Tcho-Tcho of the Tsang plateau, the Abominable Snowmen of Mi-Go and the Deep Ones of Ponape (also spelled Pohnpei and earlier Bonabee), were the scattered remnants of the Old Ones’ worshippers on Earth.

How little I knew!.

Micronesia, Ponape

THE ASSASSINS

In tracing the history of that infamous and terrible cult of the Hashishim more commonly called the Assassins, we must look to the deviant groupings of the Muslim faith.

The first, and most important schism within Islam was based upon different attitudes regarding him whom they call The Prophet (i.e. Mohammed). On the one hand we have the Sunni’s, who accept the Koran (as presented by The Prophet) as the source of religious authority. The main opposition group is that of the Shi’ite persuasion, which holds that every
age has its own divinely inspired leader or Imam who has absolute, God-given authority over all men.

According to the Shi’ites each Imam has positively superhuman powers – handed down from age to age since Adam. To the Shi’ites, each Imam is, quite literally, the voice of God on earth.

As the Shi’ite sect begun to emerge, being in the minority, it protected itself by resorting to secrecy. And when Shi’ism itself began to fragment this led to the formation of a whole range of new secret societies – most notably the Ishmaelites.

The Ishmaelites are distinguished by their belief that Ishmael son of Ja’far was the seventh Imam and heir to the power and
authority of Adam – all other Sunni’s and Shi’ites believe Ishmael to have been an evil man legally deprived of the Imamate by his father. The Ishmaelite sect also gave rise to yet another sub-group, a secret society within a secret society.! I refer, of course, to the Assassins.

So far as modern scholars, including my own source, have been able to ascertain the facts in this matter, the cult of the Assassins was established by Hassan ibn Sabah – the Old Man of the Mountains – in about 1,090 AD.

Ibn Sabah’s nickname allegedly accorded him by the Crusaders, tells us much about both parties. The term ‘old man‘ could be derived from the idea of a wise man or sage, since Ibn Sabah himself was certainly not ‘old’ in years. It is quite possible, on the other hand, that ‘old’ was meant to refer to the alleged antiquity of Ibn Sabah’s authority, which implies that some of the Crusaders at least were prepared to recognize that authority.

The ‘mountains‘ referred to, are in northern Iraq, where Ibn Sabah had his personal stronghold at Alamut – The Eagle’s Nest – from which he and his successors directed a reign of terror which reached throughout the Arab world, and beyond.

El Alamut

But what was the real purpose behind the formation of this sect?

Certainly Hassan ibn Sabah and the later Grand Masters of the sect were interested in power, indeed there was a time, before their ambitions were temporarily thwarted by the arrival of Genghis Khan and the Mongol hordes, when it looked as though the Assassins might take control of the entire Muslim world.

The influence of the Assassins, as their name implies, was based primarily upon the practice of executing anyone who incurred the Master’s displeasure or who offered a threat to the cult, either real or imagined. These executions were earned out by carefully trained and utterly dedicated killers called the Fidavis. The training is of particular interest since it involved certain mind altering techniques.

I have already mentioned that the Assassins were also known as the Hashishim. This alternative title relates to the practice of drugging initiates with hashish and then introducing them into a purpose-built ‘heaven on earth’ — a luxurious palace surrounded by beautiful gardens and inhabited by throngs of lovely women who attended to the initiate’s every desire during his brief stay. After a suitable period of time the initiate was drugged again, returned to the Eagle’s Nest, and told that he could only return to Paradise if the Master willed it, that is, if he unhesitatingly obeyed the Master’s every command. The results of this process were remarkably successful

The ‘uniform’ of the Assassins, who most certainly remain to existence even today, consisted of a white robe, a red belt and black or red boots.

It should be noted, however, that just as they are skilled in the many means of killing so are they well trained in every aspect of the art of disguise. Their absolute obedience to the will of their masters is unparalleled, even by the deadly Ninjas of the East, since they have no fear of death but rather welcome it as the one road back to that paradise they have already experienced!

In the 13th century the invading Mongols, led by Genghis Khan’s liutenant, Halaku, seemed to have wiped out the Assassins as part of their drive to exterminate Islam. Yet when the Mongols were finally forced back by the Sultan of Egypt the Assassins reemerged as strong as ever, not only in Syria (where their power had remained largely intact), but also in Persia, Afghanistan (where they called themselves the Roshaniya – the ‘illuminated ones’) and India (as the Thugees).

But the Assassins were no longer operating only in the Middle-East and India. By indirect means they had penetrated into the very heart of Christendom itself, thus providing the basis for every subsequent secret society of any note throughout the length and breadth of Europe.

THE KNIGHTS TEMPLAR

The exact date for the foundation of the Knights Templar, like many other aspects of this ambiguous organization, is almost impossible to fix with absolute precision.

Some writers suggest 1118 or 1120AD, whilst others place it up to ten years earlier. What we can be sure of, however, is that by 1120AD at the latest, the first nine members of the order were securely installed in that part of the (Christian) King of Jerusalem’s palace – that part which stood on the site of what had once been King Solomon’s Temple.

Even at this early part of the history of the Templars we come across a series of intriguing paradoxes.

1. Firstly, it Is alleged that Hugues de Payen, the first Master of the Order, and all his colleagues were ‘poor’ knights. Yet within a very short space of time following the foundation of the Order the knights began to send large sums of money back to France, specifically to the Abbot of the Cistercian monastery at Clairvaux – Saint Bernard. This was extremely fortunate, from the monk’s point of view, since it lifted them from being on the verge of bankruptcy to a position as one of the most influential orders in the Western world. 
2. Secondly, there is the question of the seemingly instant acceptance of the founder knights by King Baudouin I. By what means were the nine, able to gain such immediate and extensive favours? 
3. Thirdly, we must examine the Templars’ declared objective – to make the roads of Palestine safe for pilgrims and other travellers. Yet how could they hope to succeed in such a massive task?. Their seal emphasized their alleged poverty by showing two knights upon a single horse. Even with e horse apiece, how could nine men police such a large area simple handed? And lastly, who were they guarding the roads against?

In 1127 a majority of the Templars, including Hugues de Payen, returned to France where they were welcomed as “the epitome and apotheosis of Christian values”!

De Payen was officially proclaimed the Grand Master (!) of the Knights of the Order of the Temple, a semi-religious order of warrior-monks. It was also at this time that they were granted the exclusive tight to wear white mantles over their armour adorned with a red cross on the left side.

One hundred and eighty years later, the Templars were so rich that they had become the bankers of Europe, so powerful that they recognized allegiance to no one, not even the Pope, yet at the same time they were reviled on all sides as despotic, degenerate devil-worshippers.

I can hardly think that I need to impress upon my readers the many similarities between the Assassins on the one side, and the Templars on the other. Indeed, many of those who came into contact with the Templars quickly learnt that the sect had adopted many of the Assassins’ ideas and methods.

[Translator’s Note: At this point Professor Archensbak’s notes become totally fragmentary. In essence he merely outlines the conflict which arose between Phillipe IV – Phillipe le Bel – and the Templars, which Archensbak attributes primarily to the Templars’ growing arrogance towards everyone, from the Pope downwards, and more importantly to the fact that Phillipe was heavily in debt to the Templars with little or no hope of being able to pay that debt.]

When two Popes in succession refused to help Phillips in his plan to suppress the Templars, both died under suspicious circumstances.

Phillipe was thus able to have his own candidate elected to the office, and in less than two years a list of charges of blasphemy had been drawn up, and the Templars’ strongholds had been overthrown.

Amongst the charges drawn up against the Templars two, in particular, are worthy of note.

• In the first it was alleged that all Templars, on entering the order, were required to reject Jesus Christ as a false prophet and to spit and trample upon a crucifix placed on the floor for this purpose.
• The second charge concerns something, possibly a sculpture of a bearded head, which was called Bafomet, said to have been held in the highest reverence.

On the subject of the renunciation of Christ by the members of what was apparently a Christian order I will have more to say later. For the moment let me merely suggest a parallel between this practice and the Assassins’ effective rejection of Mohammed.

The matter of Bafomet may be dealt with immediately – since there can be little doubt as to its true significance.

Many scholars have worried over the name Bafomet, not only because of the uncertainty as to what it was, but also because this Arabic-sounding word is not found in that language in that exact form. Yet we hardly need to look far for en explanation, for there is indeed a very similar word in Arabic, namely abufihamet – which breaks down as abu, meaning ‘father of’ or ‘source of,’ and fihamet (from the root word fehm), meaning ‘wisdom‘ or ‘understanding.’

If we then take Bafomet to mean ‘father of wisdom’ are we not led inexorably back to the Assassins yet again, at their belief in the Imam of the age – their own Grand Master – as the only true source of all knowledge.

Moreover, despite the praise heaped upon them as the defenders of the Holy Land, the Templars actually fought only when it suited them to do so, and even then it was not always only on behalf of their fellow Crusaders.

So, now, we have seen the Assassins as a cult dedicated to the pursuit of power, though not averse to the accumulation of wealth – through murder, kidnapping and blackmail – when the opportunity arose. The Templars, on the other hand seem to have had little interest in power for its own sake, except as a means of protecting their own interests. Their dedication to the pursuit of wealth in all its forms, however, was legendary, almost obsessive.
 

So what happened to the Templars, and to their vast wealth?

As an organization they were broken up by the raids staged by Philippe IV in 1307. In 1312 the Order was officially disbanded by papal decree, and in 1314 the last Grand Master, Jacques de Molay, was burned at the stake by command of Phillipe.

Yet this was hardly the end of the Templars. In the first place their treasure was never found, nor has it been discovered up to the time at which I write. As for the individual members. comparatively few were seized, and even fewer put to death. The survivors undoubtedly found ‘new’ allegiances elsewhere.

Some knights simply moved from France to Prussia where they would undoubtedly have been welcomed by highly sympathetic knights of the Teutonic Order. Others, taking advantage of the war which was in progress between Scotland and England took the road to the Highlands, where the papal decree had been totally ignored. In both cases the exiles did not simply rest on the memories of their past. Rather they began to build the foundations of new orders.

One society, created by the exiles in Scotland, became what we now know as Freemasonry. Those in Germany, with a far greater dedication to secrecy, borrowed their new title from the Afghans.

They became the llluminati!

by J.S. Chiappalone
presented by Annwn Publications
1997

from TheAnnwnEssays Website

recovered through WayBackMachine Website

CULTS

Two examples of their dangers and brainwashing.

I have repeatedly warned about the dangers of both organized religions and sects, cults, etc. The danger is not the shared path by like-minded people towards a goal but rather, the control of genuine seekers who are reduced to a sheep-like mentality (and a lot of real demons and robots of the Counterfeit Creation) by evil archons in these rigid, dogmatic, destructive institutions which are there to prevent any sort of spiritual freedom.

They are there simply to harness True (non-evil) beings and minimize their chances of awakening while at the same time they are stripped of as much energy as possible in all sorts of both nefariously surreptitious ways and brazenly obvious, overt, unscrupulous ways, as these short essays below about one such cult by Justin, in which he had been caught for a time, and by Sarah, who had almost been, amply demonstrate.
 

ESSAY ONE

Justin McFadyen, of Victoria, Australia, writes:

“Dear Dr Chiappalone
It is with great interest that I read what you and others of Annwn Publications wrote about Elizabeth Clare Prophet and her organization. As a former member of that organization, I agree with everything you have published.

Further to that, I have written the following in the hope that it may be of some assistance to others.

ELIZABETH CLARE PROPHET – THE ULTIMATE BLUFF
The following has been written in hindsight of my experiences within Elizabeth Clare Prophet‘s Spiritual New Age organization originally founded as the Summit Lighthouse then later christened the Church Universal and Triumphant.

It should be noted that what is written is not intended in any way to be in support of or empathy with the Teachings and beliefs of the Organization and its followers.

I am in full support of the right that each of us has to choose that which we believe and the right to act according to our beliefs. However I believe that if we are seeking the truth, with sincerity and good intentions, that the organizations we are involved with should not separate us and our common search for the truth.

I know that those within this organization from which I escaped may not find this pleasant reading within their current mind-set, they may be called to give worldwide decree, prayer and mantra vigils against myself or others who speak out against such deceit and injustice. These decree, prayer and mantra vigils, I know to be a very real, vicious and destructive energy, when directed at one personally is no less than a form of intense black magic, hell-bent on the destruction of the ones it is targeted at.

My hope is that those truly sincere people who are still involved and committed to this organization will start to think for themselves and question all that is taught them. That they will not blindly swallow each and everything that is fed them. That they will remember the promise of Jesus that the Kingdom of God is within them. That they truly analyze and scrutinize the effects and impact of the Teachings and their practices upon themselves and their lives.

I had always believed, that I had a reasonably strong will and self-determination, yet I wasn’t prepared for what lay ahead. I spent three of the most intense years of my life deeply buried in a New Age organization known as The Summit Lighthouse, aka The Church Universal and Triumphant, led by Elizabeth Clare Prophet and based in Montana, U.S.A.

I was exploited and conned out of many thousands of dollars, exploited emotionally, mentally and physically, and gave incredible amounts of energy and time to what I now realize was a lost cause.

I eventually escaped from my imminent self-destruction under the guise of spiritual salvation. It was one of the most difficult and exhausting experiences of my life. I believe I escaped due to my desire to push everything to the limit to apply all that was taught to the extreme, to sincerely and truly make it all work and of course I acknowledge the help that was given me, known and unknown.

With a truly honest and determined approach I was eventually able to see that all that I had striven to achieve within this organization and in my life was coming to naught; worse still, everything was going backwards at a rapidly increasing rate. All the promises, hopes and dreams that were given me were eventually seen for the illusions and lies that they were.

However it brings me no peace to know that there are many others who may be still trapped within these vulturous lairs, where they are nothing more than a meal ticket of extraordinary proportions. They, like I was, are exploited and milked in every conceivable way.

What’s more, they applaud, cheer and fawn over their Leader, Elizabeth Clare Prophet (ECP) and the so-called Ascended Masters, the spiritual benefactors of this organization, all the while they are being chewed up and spat out incessantly. I was from early on overwhelmed by the seemingly large proportion of insincere people in this organization who initially seemed welcoming and friendly.

But very soon all this changes when you become a committed part of the organization. I remember saying out loud on several occasions that I do not want to end up like them after 10 years in this organization. I could never really understand why those who have listened and followed the teachings for over a decade did not seem to follow the fundamental spiritual principles which they, above all others, are supposed to know so well.

There are, of course, those who are genuinely committed to doing what they believe is the right thing.

One of the main problems is that you are always made to focus on yourself and your own shortcomings as the traditional and well-known religious adages go, you have to “turn the other cheek” and also you are not to judge others, lest ye be judged. However these very principles are what keep you bound and trapped within such an organization. For you are forever excusing away the inexcusable, forever overlooking that which should necessitate closer scrutiny, and ultimately looking upon your own weaknesses and lack of spirituality as the cause.

Elizabeth Clare Prophet speaks and commands with such authority that none dare to question or doubt even the slightest thing that she says. She gives weekly dictations which are similar but, according to her, not channeling of the Ascended Masters, the Angels, The Elohim, the Archangels.

It is proclaimed that she is the highest representative of God upon this planet and the beings that talk through her confirm this to be so.

Elizabeth Clare Prophet condemns clairvoyance, psychic powers and the like to be of the lower astral realms and dangerous for anyone to engage in. All the while it appears that she manifests these same phenomena which, of course, are supposed to have no relationship to the psychic or clairvoyant, that her followers are forever warned against engaging in.

Elizabeth Prophet has such command and control over her followers that it has to be seen to be believed. Looking back, it is very easy to see the incredible bluff by which people are held captive. Firstly all people are kept in bondage and slavery through mainly subtle threats of damnation and failure if any leave the teachings, although none of her brainwashed followers see her as anything other than an un-ascended Master, holding the highest office of God on this planet.

These are not over-embellished statements, but exact ones of the true situation. If anything they are understatements. A genuine, objective, honest researcher into this organization will prove this to be so.

I spent three full years in this organization, read several thousands of pages of the literature and listened to several hundred dictations and videotape recordings. I witnessed personally the behavior and development of the people associated with the organization throughout my time there.

The following points indicate the fear and threat tactics that ECP uses, along with the so-called representatives of God that speak through her:

• This path is the Highest Path to God
• Those who leave the Teachings may not be granted another opportunity to walk this path (by God) for possibly 100,000 years
• Those who do not Ascend are not immortal beings
• You cannot ascend until you have balanced almost 100% of your Karma. And if you are allowed to Ascend before you have balanced 100% of your Karma then you must still balance the remainder in the Ascended state
• Those who do not use the Violet Flame of Saint Germaine cannot ascend
• You cannot Ascend without attending a certain portion of the weekly services held by the organization
• You can not Ascend without the daily use of the decrees provided by this organization
• Those who have left the teachings are considered to have taken the Left Handed Path, by many of the followers of ECP. Theirs is, of course, or so they claim, the right handed path to God, so it does not leave much to the imagination to determine what the left handed path is

NOTE: The Ascension is the ultimate goal of the followers of ECP and The Ascended Masters. It is said to be the process whereby once we have balanced all our karma and fulfilled our service to God, we are reunited with that immortal part of our being and again become one with God, from whom we were separated in our fall from grace and rebellion against him, as is supposed to have occurred in the Biblical documented fall of Lucifer.
 

It should be known that ECP herself has claimed to have balanced her karma twice over!

So from all of the above points it can be seen that any person who was sufficiently brainwashed would suffer great anxiety and fear if ever confronted with the possibility of leaving or having to leave the organization. I know this to be true for I experienced it personally.

I would like to give an example of the most amazing control that Elizabeth Clare Prophet has over her followers. In 1993 she gave a lecture entitled “Nine Cats, Nine Lives”, in which she herself proclaimed that she had been a prostitute in a past life and that it was God’s will for her to be a prostitute to balance her karma!

(This is a great way to validate our lives. It means one can say that being an evil exploitative prostitute, etc., in a life may be God’s will used to balance one’s karma!)

I remember being approached by a long time follower (15 years +) who was so joyful at hearing this explanation, that she was literally bubbling with joy at the prospect of her exalted spiritual Guru being a prostitute. The only way I could later rationalize this was that it helped her equate with her own lowliness and insignificance that most people are conditioned to feel.

Of course there is always the odd pep talk and encouragement to make you feel as if you are one of the chosen of God. This pep talk encourages you when you are at your lowest to get up and give your all again, body, mind and soul for the cause. But mostly all that comes through the books, tapes, lectures, dictations (channellings) is just a constant form of subtle and not-so-subtle put-down.

One dictation by the Ascended Master Morya even suggested that everyone wear badges saying that “I want to be pummeled!”.

This was a serious statement, not an intended pun, meaning that they wanted to be chastised and punished by the so-called Masters and leaders of the organization for their own good, benefit and discipline. Thank God, I left just before I got my badge! After all, I couldn’t take any more pummeling than I already had.

The above mentioned audio tapes are still available through the organization.

Elizabeth Prophet in one lecture that I was listening to was discussing a past experience when a number of people left the organization. She was explaining how this had caused her great sadness and that she didn’t understand why, until, of course, one of the Ascended Masters came to her and explained that those who left did not have enough love within them.

In my opinion, such a ploy was a very powerful one which could play on the emotions and fears of the followers if, and when, they were to ever contemplate leaving.

Another one of the main teachings of this organization was that of the “Threefold Flame” – a small flame that was said to be burning within our hearts at a spiritual level. This flame consists of three plumes each one representing Love, Wisdom and Power – pink, blue and yellow respectively.

Another one of our enormous tasks was to balance this flame within our hearts, through the application of the teachings, decrees, services, karma balancing, etc. It was taught that this flame could be extinguished through one outburst of temper or anger! This meant that our Divine spark once extinguished is like a loss of one’s Divinity, literally like a spiritual death of our being.

(If this was true, Jesus would have lost his when he had an angry outburst whipping the money-lenders who despoiled God’s temple.)

Another very popular teaching of ECP and the Masters was that of what they termed “Mechanized Man” – a robotic, totally godless creation that had no divinity within it.

(This teaching had great appeal for me as I had independently observed that there were many people in life who by their behavior and attitude, fitted this description. This godless creation was supposedly created by the fallen ones, those who rebelled against God, as typified in the biblical fall of Lucifer and his angels.)

Due to the great burdens, responsibilities and stress that one feels within this organization it is very easy to have outbursts of anger on occasions and it is a common thing for many of ECP’s followers to let out their pent-up repression, anxiety and stress. Then they would suffer the fear, anxiety and mental torment that they had extinguished their Divine spark (Threefold Flame), which would make them no different than the “Mechanized Man” or godless creation.

After leaving The Summit Lighthouse or Church Universal & Triumphant, I managed to obtain a copy of a book entitled “Lambs to Slaughter” by John Pietrangelo who was in the organization for 14 years.

This book would never be read or believed by the loyal supporters of ECP. It is an insider’s behind-the-scenes look at ECP, her ex-husband and founder of the Organization, Mark Prophet, who is now, supposedly, an Ascended Master. ECP is currently married to husband # 4.

An ex-husband of ECP’s, Randall King, features prominently. This book is almost incredible reading, by any standards and yet it is truthful, for I can verify much of what is written through my own experiences. Elizabeth Clare Prophet’s ex husband Randall King confesses that for years he would secretly meet at night with ECP while she was still married to Mark Prophet to fulfill her sexual demands.

The rules in this organization are very strict. It would be closer to the truth to say that this organization is run like a dictatorship, where you must do everything that you are told or else suffer the consequences of your karma.

One example I can give is where Lord Maitreya, states that his Chelas (disciples of a religious teacher) are not allowed to eat sugar in any form, including, honey, rice malt, barley malt, raw sugar and refined sugars. It was likely that you would not ascend if you ate sugar in any form also. I could never find a valid reason or explanation for this though.

At the time, I was already practicing a strict fanatical organic vegetarian diet that excluded most refined products. However, I could not understand why we could not use a little natural sweeteners. From my studies and experiences I failed to see the harm that this would cause to our spiritual wellbeing. Years later, after leaving the organization, I had a strong feeling that, in some way, the total exclusion of sugars in our diet may allow for greater brainwashing and control.

The Church Universal and Triumphant is said to be Lord Maitreya’s mystery school.

In the organization run by ECP, the degree of how much sex married couples are allowed to have on a weekly basis is prescribed. The total was to be no more than half an hour per week. I know this to be true as I was elected to the Board of Directors for the regional branch of the Organization that I attended and was made to sign papers that vowed to the above requests.

A further point to the above, the week after I escaped from the organization, I had in my possession two videos of ECP, one when she was on the Oprah Winfrey show, in which she categorically and vehemently (and mendaciously) denied that the married members of the organization were only allowed to have 30 minutes of sex per week.

This was, and is, utter hypocrisy, I had personally signed the papers as part of my election to the board of directors that stated exactly this time specification!

These same papers stated that only married couples were allowed to have sexual relations.
 

GIVE AND YOU SHALL RECEIVE!
Prophet is always in one way or another trying to milk her followers of money.

There is always the requests for regular tithing to the organization and fund raising events. The promise of receiving tenfold what you give is perceived as a 10 to 1 bet that cannot lose. However, in reality, most of the followers are on the poverty line. I have not seen anyone receive anything in return for their constant giving and sacrifice.

The problem is that everything can be rationalized. For example, you are said to have received many blessings of the light of God in your life, the privilege of walking this Path, the gift of more and more opportunities to be of service to God, the books, teachings, protection of the Angels, balancing of your karma, etc… etc… ad nauseam.

One well-known statement of the Ascended Masters and ECP was that our reward was the opportunity for more service and giving to the Ascended Masters and the organization, and there was unlimited opportunities for that!

Here is another example of one of the most cunning and deceitful manipulations of her followers to gain money: ECP announced that the Ascended Master, El Morya, was calling for each of his Chela’s to send in $1000 to the organization. After all, who would dare refuse such a request from an exalted being of God? I certainly didn’t, and I was twice a fool because I sent the equivalent of US dollars which totaled at that time $1,500 Australian, for I felt that it would not be $1000 if it arrived as say $US 650.

With the request was the much promoted promise that we would receive tenfold in return that which we gave to God. Well here is what happened to me: At the time, I had a total of $3000 dollars in the bank which I had just managed to put together in the last three months. Prior to this I had been in debt for three years paying off loans for various things and for specialized education.

I finally had saved a little collateral, a little slice of financial freedom. Well, I enthusiastically made the decision to send off the $US 1,000 ($AU 1,500) and believed that my Masters would be well pleased, and that I would be looked after in the future if I needed help. Later that same week the engine in my car blew up and I was forced to cough up not only the remaining $1500 dollars in my bank but quite a bit more.

As if that wasn’t enough, my little old car was never the same again. The mechanics did an appalling job. I was soon forced to take out another loan for yet another car which bound me to debt for another 3 years.

I was so pre-occupied with trying to serve and please those whom I believed to be my benevolent Spiritual Masters and benefactors, that I forgot to check the oil in my car. I was attending 3-4 services a week at a distance of one hour’s drive, holding personal decree, prayer and mantra vigils for 2-4 hours daily, and on weekends for 4-10 hours.

At this time I was also tithing 10% of my net wages to the local branch in Melbourne “The Summit Lighthouse Study Group of Melbourne”, and giving regularly at each of the services, as well as to the regular fund-raising programs. I estimate that the net loss to me for my involvement with the organization would be $20,000, at least.

That is not to mention all the additional work I gave up to attend services and fulfill my spiritual obligations, the traveling costs over 3 years, and most importantly, all the time and energy I gave with such goodwill and intentions. Fortunately, I had left several months before making the trip to Montana I had planned.

Other people wasted over 10-15 years of their time in the organization, spent up to, or over, $100,000 dollars, in their devotion and commitment to the Organization.

This included several trips to the organization’s headquarters in Montana, U.S.A., the purchase of bomb shelters, the purchase of emergency food supplies – in the event of world cataclysm which ECP and the Ascended Masters were so fond of predicting – tithing, constant giving to all the fund-raising events, “Love Offerings” (as they were called at each of the regional services where, at the end, a bowl was passed around for contributions) attending the Summit University Courses in Montana and so on.

The Summit University courses are exalted to such a degree that a member of the Organization is made to feel as if she/he must attend, otherwise they will not Ascend. Many gave up their jobs to attend these courses as they run for 2-3 months each and there are several levels known as SU 1 & SU 2, etc.

A member of the local organization who held such lightly concealed enmity, jealousy and hatred towards me, lorded it over me on occasions, citing how he had attended two levels and that he had etheric stripes on his spiritual bodies to show for it.

He stated that I should do everything possible to attend Summit University and that I should pray very hard that I may be able to do it. It was reported to me by a friend, and long-time member of the organization, that at one time ECP requested that everyone should sell their house and give 10% of it to her.

One particular little old lady who was quite sincere but naive and innocent had to be reassured that she should not do this.

I believe it was in 1987 when ECP announced that earth changes and major cataclysms were about to occur. At this time many members of the organization sold, homes, businesses, quit jobs, moved families, nationally and internationally. Then when nothing happened ECP, of course, was adept at saying in lectures that she never said such and such, etc., etc.

One member of the Organization whom I knew, related to me how ECP had personally called for them to go from Australia to Montana because of these predictions.

John Pietrangelo, in his book of exposés of Elizabeth Clare Prophet jokingly but accurately called her Elizabeth Clear Profit!

When one understands that she owns literally everything including the 33,000 acres of land that is The Church Universal and Triumphant, and the minds of all her followers, and yet claims to just take for herself a modest wage, each week, which is quite a ridiculous concept to the objective observer who would see Prophet forever parading in the most expensive, new designer clothes on many frequent occasions.

The staff of the organization are no more than underpaid (if paid at all), overworked servants and slaves.

I have first hand information and experience from those who lived and worked at the Montana headquarters, who worked fulltime (rather all the time), for tiny quarters and meals and a small allowance per month of sometimes no more the $US 64. Non-permanent staff had to pay for the privilege of working for the Organization. The staff worked extremely long hours and then in their spare time they had to attend all the services, lectures, dictations.

They were expected to be up at 5 a.m. to commence daily decree and prayer vigils, lunchtime decree sessions and evening decree sessions. On top of this, you were expected to read all the literature produced by the organization, study the lectures, listen repeatedly to the taped dictations that were given through ECP. One was expected to read material, not once, but 3 times.

The harder you worked, the more energy, money, time and effort you contributed, the more you were led to believe you were truly on the way, when, in truth, everyone was going nowhere, but was being conned and milked of every last ounce of energy, sanity, money and time. I was elected to the Board of Directors of the Melbourne Group and I know first hand what one is expected to do.

Prophet raised, in one fund-raising event only, over 1 million dollars, which was for the “Save Our Church” fund.

This fund-raising was for the defense of the Church’s tax exempt status which was reported by ECP and the organization to be under threat from the IRS. I was a member of this Church at the time and well remember the countless requests for donations or “Love Offerings” as they called them, as well as the large number of prayer and decree vigils we dedicated to this cause.

The Church announced that it had retained its tax exempt status and members were congratulated for their efforts. But how the money raised by this fund was really used is anyone’s guess. Any money left over was certainly not sent back. There is no doubt about that.

The “Pearls Of Wisdom” are the transcribed weekly dictations of (supposedly) exalted beings as Archangel Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Jesus, Mother Mary, Buddha, Zoroaster, Hercules, The Elohim, Saint Germaine, El Morya, Kuthumi, etc., etc. One quote that sticks in my mind vividly is that one of these exalted beings admonished us to “give that we may receive browny points in heaven”!

Of course I had left when I read this and could see the clear ridiculousness of such a statement.

NOTE: C.U.T (Church Universal and Triumphant) was taken right out of the Book of Revelations and purported to be a necessary undertaking that Prophet took to ensure tax evasion. After all, The Summit Lighthouse, the founding name of the organization, did not sound legitimate enough to achieve tax exemption.

NOTE: Chela is literally interpreted there to mean “slave”! The Book entitled “The Chela and the Path” by the Ascended Master, El Morya, in no uncertain terms makes this clear. What level of control and manipulation does it take to literally call the followers and disciples of the Ascended Masters slaves and for those followers to applaud, cheer, fawn and throw their life literally at the feet of these beings?
 

STRANGE & CONTRADICTING EXPERIENCESI had many experiences that were very contradictory to the whole teachings and promises of the organization. Most would not even believe them to be true. Countless nights I awoke from my sleep with the very real physical feeling of being suffocated and strangled in my sleep.

At other times I actually had clear perceptions of some monstrous type of entities sucking the life force out of me. All this occurred after saying hours of prayers for protection and appeal to the so-called higher powers of the Ascended Masters.

I could not understand how the millions and billions of Angels that were claimed to be protecting the loyal followers could not protect one person from attacks by forces of evil intent that manifested themselves more and more in my life as I was striving to achieve a level of spirituality and truth.
 

WHO, WHAT & WHERE IS EVIL?
One of the trickier aspects of this organization is that a great part of the Teachings were focused on the great Evil being perpetrated in the world.

Elizabeth and her spiritual overseers were so busy pointing and directing our attention to the Evils of this world, that it is almost impossible to look back upon their source as being of evil intent itself. Our attention was constantly directed 7 days per week to giving hours of long prayer & decree vigils, to calling for the judgment of evil, by the powers of God.

On top of this we had to seek our own salvation through the many supposedly necessary practices which had to be enacted on a daily basis. I ended up spending 40 hours at work and close to that tending to what I believed were all my spiritual obligations, which, at the time, I willingly and enthusiastically carried out.
 

JUST ANOTHER RELIGIONElizabeth Prophet teaches and lectures upon all of the world’s Religions, which becomes all the more confusing for the poor spiritual seekers who are within her organization.

It is enough for one to try and understand and assimilate the Christian Bible as it is today, let alone all the world’s major Religions. I know I could never really stomach much of the Bible, except for a few passages of the New Testament. I was genuinely attracted to this ECP organization initially because I was able to make the logical conclusion based upon my observations that Religion was the source of many wars, racism, hatred and violence that occur every day on this planet.

Yet I had no idea how I would be embedded in these very things within the ECP organization.

After I had escaped from this organization, I came to realize fully that this was just another cleverly disguised organization that was not much different to any of the world’s Religions and used much of the same tactics upon its followers.

Elizabeth Clare Prophet and all the supposedly high spiritual beings and agents of God which speak through her, use all of the fear tactics to keep the followers bound and trapped by fear, such as:

• the fear of damnation
• the fear of leaving the organization
• the fear of not being reunited with God
• the fear of loss of Divinity
• the fear of failing to balance one’s karma and having to reincarnate countless lifetimes
• the fear of karmic retribution for every thought, word, and deed outside the will of God, etc., etc.

Her followers were led to believe that this was the True organization or Church of God on this planet and that eventually all those who are to be reunited with, or Ascend to, God must eventually find this path to do so.

She does mention a few exceptions to this, but they are rare.
 

BRAINWASHING AND CONTROL EN MASSE
I never believed it possible for myself to be so brainwashed, so controlled and so much at the mercy of one such as Elizabeth Clare Prophet.

Everyone in the organization is so controlled and brainwashed, it has to be seen to be believed, yet not one would admit it. I must have had some semblance of independent thinking left within me, for I was never able to rationalize one of the main thrusts of the Teachings, that of the Law of Karma. As I looked around me, within my family, and in the world, all those not-so-nice people seemed to be having the best time of it.

Later I was able to realize that, if Karma was true and fair, all the Good people would be running this planet.

Most, if not all, of the followers whom I personally interacted with, did not think with their own minds, they did not question anything, but accepted everything that was given them at face value. When they spoke, often it was “The Mother said this”, or “The Masters said that”, or “By the Grace of God“, etc. This now is a sure sign to me that indicates such people are candidates for easy brainwashing and control.
NOTE: It should be known that ECP is known as and called by her followers as Mother. As in the “Divine Mother”, not the earthly-type mother.
 

This is really scary stuff when I think about it now. This would indicate total submission and laying of one’s self at the feet of ECP and to the Masters, to that which they will, and believe me they will and want an extraordinary amount!!!

Suffering in this organization was seen as an essential part of balancing our karma and achieving a better Resurrection, as Jesus suffered and died upon the cross, and was resurrected. The Ascended Master El Morya stated that “Suffering is the spice of life!”.

This was a hard concept for me to understand.

We were all taught to believe that suffering was/is, not only good for us, but that we should welcome our returning bad Karma as an opportunity to repay our debts and progress towards a higher level of spirituality and eventual liberation.
 

RATIONALIZATION
Everything was always rationalized to our own disadvantage by ECP and the Ascended Masters, and the self-proclaimed exalted beings, Angels, Archangels, Elohim, etc., etc., who dictated through Prophet.

For example, if one was to suffer an injury or accident, even after giving hours of prayers, decrees, and mantras for the purpose of protection, purity, karma-balancing and judgment of evil, it was still taught that it was our karma and that it was not only God’s will, but that it was necessary to experience the return of what we originally sent out, and ultimately we were just receiving the return of the evil that we ourselves were said to be responsible for.

A member of the organization who died in an automobile accident was said by ECP and the Masters to have been speeding and that we cannot be protected by the prayers, decrees, mantras, and angels of God if we are simultaneously breaking the laws of this world which we must obey at all times.

I myself cut my finger on one occasion to the point of probably needing stitches, (which I did not get), after a 4 hour prayer, decree & mantra vigil. I do remember pondering this deeply as to how and why this could possibly happen after what I had done.

Eventually I just rationalized it away as my karma, the will of God, and the balancing of a portion of something wrong or evil I committed in some time past which I had no possible way of ever knowing what the heck it was.
 

TRUE GNOSTICISM

The Writings of Dr J.S. Chiappalone & Annwn Publications

I can now put all of the above experiences into perspective through my understanding of Gnosticism. I was fortunate to find understanding of my situation and experiences in life through a study of the books written by Dr J.S. Chiappalone on Gnosticism, which have become my greatest source of understanding of my experiences and of life as we know it. These writings and teachings have also provided me with a liberation that I never dreamed possible.

The first book I read, that was lent me, upon leaving the organization, was a book entitled “Revelation of the truth”.

This book totally validated and confirmed not only my experiences in life but also my experiences in the ECP organization. For example, one chapter in this book alone, Chapter 29 – The Law of Reward and Punishment (Karma), which was only 5 pages in length, made me understand my entire predicament with ECP and her organization.

If Karma is a creation of Evil, which observation of this world would indicate is correct, for there is little, if any, justice, then the foundation of this entire ECP organization falls to pieces. I truly felt and was treated in this organization as the bad guy, as the one who needed to be punished, who needed to suffer, who needed to experience the return of my evil deeds committed over many lifetimes that I could not even remember.

While I was within this ECP organization I always felt disappointed that we were not allowed to remember our past lives, for I believed that it would be more useful if I could remember all that I had learnt in past lives.

Dr Chiappalone’s writings also state that Reincarnation is an evil-created system that is designed for us to forget purposely. This was like a huge bell ringing in my head! Of course, that explains it all. I somehow knew this to be true without a doubt.

And so, many of my answers and questions were found in these Gnostic writings.
 

ENERGY LOSS AND SUPPRESSION – REAL EXPERIENCES
Many of my experiences were not only defined but also confirmed by my study of the books of Dr J.S. Chiappalone, and Annwn Publications.

One of the most significant day to day experiences was my inability to function in the presence of certain people. These certain people had the ability to drain me of energy, to make me feel extremely suppressed, depleted of energy, totally at a loss and dejected within my work environment. To make things worse, I felt this way with many I worked with.

Dr Chiappalone explains that the purpose of the entire evil-created system that we live in at present is set up for the extraction of energy from those of the True Creation.

He describes energy suckers that certain beings have on the energy level which attach to you and drain you of your energy. Well I could certainly relate to this for this experience was common to me, even though at the time I didn’t understand it. I erroneously believed it to be a problem of my own make-up, and a daily occurrence at work.

Wherever I would go, I could not escape this very real feeling of energy depletion. The writings of Dr J. Chiappalone not only helped me to recognize specific instances of this, but they also helped me so that I was soon able to deal with it to such a degree that I could prevent it to a large degree. I do not doubt I have managed the problem, because those same people, and there were many who previously drained me, no longer have this effect on me.

My mind is clearer, I can now function within my work environment, and I am instantly able to recognize those who are depleting my energies. This was perhaps my greatest obtained liberation and freedom.

Now I can recognize that the ECP organization was all about how much energy they could obtain from you. All the surface things, all the small truths, all the glamour, books, teachings, lectures, smiling so-called spiritual do-gooders, and structures were irrelevant.

After all, why else would we sit and give incredibly intense prayer decree and mantra vigils for hours upon hours, day after day, sometimes shouting, yelling, jumping, clapping, but always with all of our energy from body, mind and soul, so that we would go home literally feeling washed out and exhausted, only to have to come back again and again and do the same thing.

Why did God need our energy we were giving? Did he not have enough of his own? After all, he created everything in the known and unknown universes didn’t he?

Gnosticism again answers these questions through the understanding that there are two creations and the false creation which came about as a result of what is termed the Celestial Error, needs the energy of the true creation to survive and it obtains it by stealing it, for the false creation should never have existed.

I realize these are difficult points to understand, and I urge any who want greater understanding to read the books.”

ESSAY TWO

Sarah Lang of California writes:

Dear Dr. Chiappalone,

I have just finished reading what you have to say about the dangers of cults in your book Making Sense of the Madness, Volume One, and it brought back to me some of the traps I almost got caught in during my lengthy search for answers to the meaning of life.

One in particular comes to mind. It operates as a church, although I believe that it is more as a tax dodge than as a genuine church. During the time when I almost became involved with it, it was known as “The Summit Lighthouse” although I believe it is now called “The Church Triumphant” or something like that. It was founded by a Mark Prophet who took over a group called “I am”.

After Mark Prophet’s death, his wife, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, took charge and has been running the show ever since. When I say she has been running the show, that is exactly what she puts on – a show. In fact, when I first experienced her performance, it was under a Big Top circus tent at Mount Shasta sometime in the 1980s, I believe, although it could have been earlier. I had never been to Mount Shasta and I thought this might be a good opportunity to visit the area as well. I remember that there was an unseasonal snowfall while we were there.

As we were all seated under the tent waiting for the arrival of the one who was referred to as the Mother, one would have thought we were waiting for the Messiah, so great was the build-up and anticipation in the crowd. As I think back on this woman in the very fancy floor-length gown, I can remember pushing back the thought that she had a very ostentatious and arrogant air about her when she finally arrived at the front of the make-shift “temple”. I could not help but wonder at the very obvious obsequious fawning that was going on around her.

My memory of specific points of the event is a bit hazy at this point in my life but I recollect a lot of chanting, or what was referred to as “decreeing”, until my voice was hoarse. It seemed like a huge energy warm-up in preparation for the main event – direct “dictation” by some of the Ascended Masters. I remember St. Germaine was one, Jesus was another and I believe Kootoomi was included. There were others as well.

The interesting thing was, they all sounded exactly the same – voice-wise, content-wise, energy-wise – and nothing very startling or unexpected was said. In fact, after a while, I found it all quite boring.

I continued to doubt the authenticity when one of the so-called Ascended Masters talked about abortion and how it was against God‘s law and a great sin; how all children were a blessing and it seemed the more the better; that a pregnant woman was special and I believe it was also stated that contraception is also against the will of God.

As I understand Elizabeth Prophet changes her “facts” and doctrines to suit the time, this may not be what comes “through” her now, but it definitely was on that crisp, snowy day at Mt. Shasta.

The only other thing that vividly comes to mind about the production is how the woman stressed the need for everyone to decree constantly as an aid to certain “trouble spots” in the world. She insisted that it was everyone’s duty to assist the world in this way.

During my week-end stay I met a woman who with great effort spoke in a very husky voice. She said that the doctor had told her she must not use her voice for a time or she was in danger of permanently losing her ability to speak. She very proudly stated that it did not matter to her, that it was too important for her to continue doing as Elizabeth Prophet commanded and decree and decree and decree, even if it might mean permanent loss, that nothing was too great a sacrifice.

It seemed that tithing was an important part of the doctrine of the so-called church. One should give at LEAST 10% of one’s gross income. However, tithing involved more than money; it involved giving 10% of one’s time (or 2 hours, 40 minutes each day) to the sacred act of decreeing (affirming out loud special decrees from the book of decrees or special ones added by Prophet), etc.

The violet flame of St. Germaine was always emphasized. I also learned from some of the followers that it was important to dress in a particular color for each day of the week. I no longer remember which color goes with what day.

Although it was claimed that vegetarianism was the order of the day, the daughter of Elizabeth Clare Prophet was later to expose various practices of her mother which were in variance from those she preached. These included her charge that while the underlings were not to eat meat, she and her family often did.

It is also difficult to reconcile E.C. Prophet’s belief that blacks are intrinsically inferior, in view of her expressed belief in reincarnation. Although Prophet had nothing good to say about the organized religions, she borrowed a great deal from them, especially Catholicism with its saints and rosary beads.

One has to wonder why this person has devoted so much energy and money in building an underground city to ward off anticipated nuclear fallout if she really believes in the immortality of the spirit and that life is better on the other side.

Is it that she fears what awaits her when death finally overtakes her? Is this pain-filled world of suffering so appealing to her that she will go to such extreme lengths to maintain her control here?

I later made the acquaintance of a young woman who was getting ready to sell her home in order to send the money to Elizabeth Prophet and nothing could talk her out of doing that. All her money went in that direction and all her time went into the many, many activities that were carried on in Prophet’s name.

She ended up leaving her husband who did not share her enthusiasm. I soon lost all contact with this otherwise very personable and intelligent person. As her goal was to join E.C. Prophet wherever her headquarters were at the moment, I suspect this is where she ended up.

As I read your books, Dr. Chiappalone, I become ever more grateful that I did not also end up there, prey to this particular cult. I do not know how the present day Prophet presents herself or her dogma. However, thanks to your writings, I can see with clearer eyes the insidious evilness that comes forth from her direction and can recognize Elizabeth Clare Prophet as the evil imposter she is.

With many thanks,

From a grateful reader in Pleasanton, CA.
Sarah Lang